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Juan Gabriel Vasquezbooks include the 2014 International IMPAC Dublin award winner and national bestseller, The Sound of Things Falling, as well as the award-winning The Informers and The Secret History of Costaguana.

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Overview

Civil war on the world of the atevi is finally over. And Cajeiri, son and heir of Tabini-aiji, atevi leader of the dominant Western Association, is about to celebrate his fortunate ninth birthday. Bren Cameron, brilliant human diplomat allied with Tabini, has managed to arrange a visit for Cajeiri’s three special associates from the starship Phoenix—ordinary human children who developed a bond with Cajeiri during his two years in space.

After a year of political upheaval, this is a happy event: the heir is safe, the aiji is back in power, and a massive celebration is planned in the capital. The whole world is watching.

But Bren Cameron has received evidence that security has been severely compromised from the aiji’s high office on downward. The powerful Assassins’ Guild—which provides the judicial system, law enforcement, and personal protection inatevi society—is in the hands of a man who would like to turn the entire world back two centuries.

Bren now knows the details of a decades-old plot that’s been threaded through Guild actions since before his arrival on the continent. The enemy’s best chance is to strike now, at the public celebration that is much too important and far too advanced to cancel.

Bren and his associates have no choice. If they don’t make the first move, the other side will. And the lives of the heir, his innocent human guests, and the entire ruling family are at stake.

Peacemaker

Praise

Praise for the Foreigner series:

“C.J. Cherryh’s splendid Foreigner series remains at the top of my must-keep-up reading list after two decades. Number 14, Protector, does not disappoint…. And then there’s grownup political intrigue and gunplay for the icing.” —Locus (forProtector)

“One of the best long-running SF series in existence.… Cherryh remains one of the most talented writers in the field.” —Publisher’s Weekly

“My favorite science fiction series is C. J. Cherryh’s Foreigner universe. Cherryh deftly balances alien psychology and human vanities in a character caught between being human and part of an alien race.” —Denver Post

“There is plenty of intrigue…marvelous attention to detail that makes the culture of the atevi one of the most complex, multi-layered creations in science fiction…. The Foreigner series is about as good as it gets…so finely and densely wrought that you may end up dreaming of sable-skinned giants with gold eyes, and the silver spun delicacy of interstellar politics.” —SF Site

“A seriously probing, thoughtful, intelligent piece of work, with more insight in half a dozen pages than most authors manage in half a hundred.” —Kirkus

“Cherryh superbly crafts complex intrigues and alien races possessed of integrity, as well as a sense of otherness.” —Library Journal

“A large new Cherryh novel is always welcome…a return to the anthropological science fiction in which she has made such a name is a double pleasure….Superlatively drawn aliens and characterization.” —Chicago Sun-Times